JRP HEALTHCARE INFRASTRUCTURES

Join us today and help transform healthcare!

January 2022

- January 2025

The initiative

Politecnico di Milano – Department of Architecture, Building Engineering and the Built Environment (DABC), jointly with Fondazione Politecnico di Milano, has created the Joint Research Partnership for Healthcare Infrastructures, an innovative technological partnership where companies can test and implement advanced strategies for innovation in the areas of projects, technology, organisation, building and management. The idea is to make them competitive in the new healthcare model, which is shifting from being exclusively hospital-centric to being a sustainable and user-centric system, inserted within local physical and digital networks.

The Joint Research Partnership Healthcare Infrastructures intends to act as a channel where Politecnico di Milano and companies in the Healthcare Infrastructures chain can build, share and discuss different perspectives on technological evolution. The initiative intends to develop highly challenging multi-actor and multidisciplinary projects, encouraging collaboration between university, companies and the public administration sector.

Companies joining the initiative can help steer innovation in the sector, and will consolidate their position by taking part in work groups, networking events and in setting out guidelines, as well as receiving six-monthly inclusive reports.

The role of the Foundation

Fondazione Politecnico di Milano came up with the idea and is a partner in this initiative.

Technical details

Project partners will select the research topics, which will thus truly reflect the real needs felt in the sector. Potential topics include:

Survey and organise the “as is” and “to be” information on building stock.
Develop, validate and test various evaluation models, and provide support to decisions concerning the strategic localisation of healthcare facilities.
Develop, validate and test meta-design projects for the various operating units in a hospital, with particular reference to the various departments/units (i.e. operating theatre and critical care areas, diagnostics units, accident & emergency departments, outpatients areas, inpatients areas, and general, logistics and technical services areas) and to strategic features (i.e. flexibility, resilience to major emergencies and sustainability).
Gather best international practice and establish benchmarks in the setup of functions, spaces, flows and reference paths relative to the volume of healthcare activity.
Develop, validate and test evaluation models for analysing sustainability and improving quality from a social, organisational and environmental perspective, as well as mitigating the impact of a healthcare structure on the safety and satisfaction of patients and healthcare personnel.
Carry out studies, observations and evaluations on innovative materials, air quality and advanced construction technologies, paying particular attention to the healthiness of care and treatment areas and workplaces, and also to the sustainability of products and processes used in construction.
Monitor performance properties through environmental and microclimate parameters and/or according to user-centred logics, such as air quality, design for all and wayfinding.
Study and develop solutions for energy optimisation and efficiency in the healthcare domain, and study technological solutions that can advance the digitalisation process in the Italian national healthcare system.